Las Vegas: Finding wellness in Sin City

Las Vegas hotels are organizing spas, yoga classes and hikes to help the weary traveller rejuvenate

Visitors on a guided hike in the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area observe Turtlehead peak in Las Vegas. Health and serenity can also be found in the midst of drinking, gambling and buffet-diving in Las Vegas.

By:Stephanie RosenbloomSpecial to the Star, Published on Fri Dec 06 2013

Just after dawn, when the steady clang of slot machines slowed to an irregular heartbeat and most of Las Vegas was soused or sleeping, I was jogging. The sidewalks were empty. They no longer belonged to hucksters, heartbreakers and flocks of friends, decked out and glassy-eyed. They belonged to me.

I ran past the hushed fountains of the Bellagio, over eye-popping cards for escorts and strip clubs that littered the streets like ticker tape on my way to the first of several weekend fitness classes: Yoga Among the Dolphins.

There was a time when yoga and Sin City were like fire and ice. But practicing a tree pose while a family of bottlenose dolphins looks on is just one of many health initiatives being introduced by hotels once known only for bars, buffets and smoky casinos.

The Mirage Hotel & Casino has cornered the dolphin-Ashtanga market, but its competitors have their own off-beat mind-body prescriptions. Trump Hotel recently introduced a boot camp class outside on the Strip. Aria Resort & Casino offers an hour-long “indoor hike” through the 3.8 million-square-foot property and adjacent Shops at Crystals. MGM Grand has Stay Well rooms where shower water is infused with vitamin C and air-purification systems promise to reduce toxins. And the Mandarin Oriental’s Tea Lounge serves vegan food and “health & wellness” tea blends that sound hallucinogenic, with names such as “peace through water” and “introspection.”

Las Vegas, it seems, has begun to follow the lead of other major tourist destinations. After all, wellness isn’t just good for you - it’s good for hoteliers. “Wellness tourism” is a $439-billion worldwide market and it’s projected to grow almost 10 per cent a year through 2017, according to a study conducted for the Global Spa & Wellness Summit by SRI International, a non-profit research institute.

I’d been to Vegas a couple of times, although it’s not my idea of a vacation. I aim to unwind. Las Vegas winds you up. But a healthy Vegas getaway?

I set off alone, with a duffel bag of sneakers and spandex, to roll the dice on wholesome Las Vegas.

Staying well . . . awake

It was Saturday night and MGM Grand smelled like a frat party. The lobby was teeming with young people vogue-ing for smart phone cameras: men in sunglasses, women who one day would master walking in platform stilettos, but not tonight. I snaked through stanchions and joined the check-in queue somewhere behind a woman in sneakers and a white veil as the Icona Pop song “I Love It” blared: “I don’t care! I love it! I don’t care!”

Ten minutes later, I received a room key emblazoned with the word “rejuvenate” and felt a twinge of anticipation. Walking to the elevators with my duffel was like being a steel ball in a pinball machine. I zigzagged amid partygoers and slot machines, past the Corner Cakes Pastry Shop near which I encountered stacks of my weakness: Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. I looked away and sped by, hitting everyone and everything, or maybe they were hitting me. Still, with each thwack I reminded myself that I was getting ever closer to rejuvenation.

Or not.

Shrieks. Laughter. Something that sounded like barking. Was there a party in my room? I cautiously put the key in the lock. No. But it sure sounded that way. I tossed my bag on a chair and called the front desk. Security kindly offered to quell the party, but I didn’t want to spoil the fun. I just wanted a room change. While on hold, I skimmed some nearby information cards.

“Get all the ‘zzz’s you need,” said one.

“Who knew Las Vegas could feel so rejuvenating?” said another, noting that the room’s “wellness technologies from real-estate pioneer Delios, in conjunction with the Cleveland Clinic and Dr. Deepak Chopra, are designed to help you tailor your Las Vegas experience and make it whatever you’d like it to be, including relaxing.”

I was still on hold. After hanging up, calling back and getting a supervisor on the phone, I was told they didn’t have another available Stay Well room. I pointed out that if a hotel bills a room as a place to “get all the zzz’s you need,” guests have a reasonable expectation that the room will have some measure of tranquillity.

“We did not modify the walls,” the supervisor said, adding that the Stay Well rooms are no quieter than any other room at MGM Grand.

I asked about the possibility of changing rooms the next day. She said I should call back. I suggested she call me back. She insisted I would have to be the one to follow up. I was beginning to think these Stay Well rooms were more clever than I anticipated: Rather than calm you, perhaps they were designed to challenge your deepest reserves of patience.

I hung up the phone and considered hightailing it to any number of other hotels, but in the interest of research, I stayed and began exploring the room.

A curious black box called a Scentcube was sitting on the desk. I selected the “maximum” setting and sniffed but then switched the thing off just as quickly for fear that the cloying fragrance MGM pumps into the lobby might waft out.

The blinding “energizing light” in the bathroom designed to boost your energy by suppressing melatonin actually seemed to help, especially the next morning after an hour-and-a-half night’s sleep. Also in the bathroom: An attachment to the shower head that looked like a supersized orange prescription tube — the “vitamin C shower infuser” — was supposed to rehydrate my skin. I can’t say it appeared dewier.

I was looking forward to some sort of video enlightenment from Chopra given that there was a designated “wellness room channel,” but all I saw was an overview of the room features, which included Electric Field Shielding technology (designed to prevent “electric fields” from keeping me up at night), an air-purification system, carbon water filters, and antimicrobial coating on the bathroom floor.

Maybe these things were doing me wonders, maybe they weren’t.

Deep breaths and dolphins

The flights of stairs that float pedestrians above busy intersections along the Strip allow for an invigorating morning warm-up. Not realizing how many there were, I was late for the 8:30 a.m. Yoga-Among-the-Dolphins class. When I arrived, I entered a dim, cerulean underwater room that abuts part of an open-air dolphin habitat and took my place on a mat among four other students, all women. The class, the instructor said, usually has men, too.

Through the large windows, we watched the dolphins and they watched us. Their presence was soothing, and when sunlight streamed down through the water, the room suddenly possessed the childhood magic of an under-the-blanket fort. That said, I find it difficult to observe animals in captivity, no matter how well they might be treated. And so, no, I hadn’t been looking at a certain dolphin when in mid-stretch the woman to my left blurted out: “Is that his penis?” The room erupted in squeals.

The hour-long class is $50 and includes a post-yoga smoothie, but, more important, all-day access to the Mirage’s spa.

Though as far as spas go, I recommend Canyon Ranch SpaClub at the Venetian & the Palazzo. First you have to find it. Your best bet is to go through the Palazzo, which is calmer than the Venetian. For $25 ($40 for non-hotel guests) you can stay all day and take any fitness class.

Your money goes a long way as there are seven “Aquavana” same-sex hot and cold cabins and pools: the Crystal Steam Room, Experiential Rains, Finnish Sauna, Igloo, Herbal Laconium, HydroSpa and Thermal Heated Loungers. The sauna, with its warm simplicity, was a favourite.

A spa worth visiting is at Aria Resort & Casino, where a day pass is $30 ($40 for non-City Center guests) and includes use of an outdoor balcony therapy pool and meditation rooms. Go for the heated ganbanyoku stone beds that supposedly purge toxins and increase your circulation and metabolism!

Whether mine accomplished all that I’m not sure, but it was dark and dreamy. Lying on my back on a warm slab, meditating by candlelight, I almost forgot where I was . . . until the door flew open and a man in spa slippers clopped in. I suddenly remembered the room was coed. I wished, as I pulled my robe around me, it wasn’t.

Even so, the only real problem with Vegas spas is that to get in and out of them, you have to wind your way through casinos as if you’re Theseus in the labyrinth of the Minotaur. Any relaxation you achieve is always on the verge of unraveling.

To help retain your Zen, head to the Mandarin Oriental! Each day from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. the Mandarin serves tea in its sumptuous 23rd-floor lounge high above the Strip. I arrived a few minutes before 2 and was surprised to discover that most of the tables were reserved, though happily the hostess managed to seat me on a couch facing the windows. Of the four types of green tea on the menu, I ordered matcha, which arrived in an oversize white teapot befitting the Mad Hatter. Pouring the tea into a dainty cup, feeling its warmth in my hands, I sank into the cushions and inhaled the scent of ground leaves.

Purifying paths

At 5:55 a.m. on my final morning in Las Vegas, I pressed the “black-out” button and raised the shade on a spectacular sunrise. Then it was off for a “hike” inside Aria ($50, including access to the spa and fitness centre). I warned (threatened) the trainer that I was no athlete. He gave me a quizzical look and handed me a bag with a yoga mat, water, towel and a five-pound weight.

As we talked and walked, I approached an escalator. He redirected me to the stairs. For the next hour, we went up and down I don’t know how many flights, indoors and out, pausing at a bench in the lobby to do squats, dips and push-ups.

The hike is also a fun way to see the art in and around the hotel, such as the reclaimed silver sculpture above the reception desk by Maya Lin. Near the LED art installation “Vegas,” by Jenny Holzer, we did twists and squats with weights.

But hotel air is not mountain air. Up until now, all my activities had taken place by the Strip, so I decided I’d venture beyond. Several companies offer bus tours of the nearby Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area, but I wanted one that would allow me to get out and hike. I opted for Red Rock Canyon Tours, which offers a three-hour tour, including an hour-and-a-half hike, from the Paris Hotel ($59 a person). Our guide, Tom Dziadek, led us along sandstone quarry trails toward Turtlehead Peak, pointing out prickly pear (lifesavers if you’re lost in the desert, he noted), agave plants (tequila!) and juniper trees (gin!).

“You’re going to be purified after this tour,” he said.

I don’t know about purified. But as I climbed higher and higher, I was feeling pretty good.

It turns out, you can find wellness in a city of excess. The best thing I did toward achieving that was waking up early. Seeing the sun rise over the mountains keeps you motivated, and you’ll have the sidewalks to yourself.

The New York Times

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